Navigating Education without Student Debt

Financial Advice

Boston University developed a large free online finance class specifically designed for those pursuing theological education. If you’re looking for a more education in the area of Faith and Finances, you can access that for free here:

There is some debate about the effectiveness of further education toward curbing student loan debt, but if you are looking for education it is available. If you find you need more accountability (you know what to do, just having trouble implementing), you can seek assistance in that area. Whatever your area of need, there are resources available!

These plans often have payments lower than the interest accruing, so the balance on your student loans can actually GO UP over time. This essentially makes you dependent on loan forgiveness as your only way out of debt.

From time to time students will ask me for direction about doing personal fundraising or crowdsourcing. Here are a couple of resources if you are curious about the crowdsourcing landscape. As always, feel free to reach out with questions or to talk through what you are thinking.

“There are three conversions necessary: the conversion of the heart, mind, and the purse.” – Martin Luther

Jordan Peterson is having “a moment”. A widely circulated interview brought his considerable platform into the spotlight with a variety of articles including this David Brooks piece which summarizes things nicely.

In the aforementioned interview, he uses a word I hadn’t fully considered: Competent.

“Competency is power”

I bounced that idea off my kids around the dinner table last night. I do want them to marry someone who is competent. Competent at cleaning the kitchen, competent at raising children, competent at balancing a checkbook, competent at managing conflict in a healthy way, competent at managing the many problems life brings.

When my wife and I started dating, my roommate and I were not competent at lots of things, not the least of which was cleaning. We once went an entire year without cleaning the kitchen. Don’t ask. The bathroom was worse, so it took most of the attention away from the kitchen. People would just leave rather then use the bathroom.

We aren’t born competent. We have to learn, and most learning comes from Someone who already knows how to do it.

It’s ok if we aren’t competent in our personal finances yet. It’s not ok for us to stay that way. We, our (future) spouse, our business partners, our children, and our parents deserve better. Have you ever had a friend (usually when you were younger) that always was asking to borrow money? It’s hard to be friends with that guy.

No judgement. I doesn’t matter when we find ourselves today. I’m much better at cleaning my kitchen these days. Let’s pick one area, talk to someone who knows that area, and start making small actions.

Creating a little extra margin in our financial lives will radically change our relationship with money. Saving or earning an extra $1,000 would make a big difference in all of our lives. We can do it in 2018.

A spark of Hope let’s us Believe it’s possible. A little Belief starts our brains looking for Opportunities. An Opportunity seized creates an Action. Action leads to the physical changing of our circumstances.

Changing our physical conditions is “work” in all its forms. The work of creating order from chaos. “All hard work brings a profit, but mere talk leads only to poverty.”

Here is an article link to get your brain working and create some hope. Hope in this case being the persistent belief that its possible to change our physical circumstances through “work”.

Those are pretty basic fundamentals – the only one I would quibble with is following financial markets, which many experts say is a waste of time. The reality is that following the market is probably an indicator of overall financial diligence. It’s correlation not causation.

It is easy to think that while we’re in a very tight season of life, as grad school is, that basics like spending less then we earn and savings aren’t possible.

While I would be the first to agree that it is very difficult, I would set it as a practice to live on a budget (spend what you earn) and save, even if it is a very small (almost token) amount. The point is that these practices will carry over into our future when our financial picture changes.

I’m continually challenged that to be “faithful with the little things” isn’t primarily a promise of future blessing, it is a promise that I will be changed. I continually screw it up, but let’s try again today.

I believe one of the most important ideas in understanding debt is what we call “Layers of Risk”. One layer that I have not taken the time to fully consider was brought to my attention in an article today. That layer of risk is student borrowers with children, and specifically single parents:

Nearly 50% of undergrad students borrowers defaulted

Of those, 70% were single parents

10% of borrowers are single parents, but they represent 40% of all defaults

These stats also include additional factors and layers of risk. For example, as the article points out if you’re a parent of a child under 3, a person of color, or enrolled in a for-profit school your default rates are even higher.

Additionally, many of these defaulted loans are for students that were unable to complete their degree so they are stuck with a non-bankruptable debt and no degree with which to increase their earning potential.

Any system that disproportionately penalizes the most vulnerable needs to be reformed.